Subject: Re: DNSEXT WGLC Summary: AXFR clarify

From: Randy Presuhn <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Dec 2002 11:57:16 -0800 (PST)

Hi -

> Date: Thu, 19 Dec 2002 10:03:34 -0800 (PST)
> From: Rick Wesson <[email-masked]>
> To: RJ Atkinson <[email-masked]>
> Cc: "'Stephane Bortzmeyer'" <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>
> Subject: Re: DNSEXT WGLC Summary: AXFR clarify
> In-Reply-To: <[email-masked]>
> Message-ID: <[email-masked]>
...
> I like that we have individuals at the ietf meetings rather than company
> representatives, in the long run it creates less politics.
...

At best, this is a useful fiction.  My limited experience has
been that the politics in the IETF are much thicker and less
transparent than in ANSI-accredited technical committees or in
the ISO/ITU collaborative work I've seen.  On the other hand,
some industry consortia seem far more opaque.

YMMV, but I've found that even when folks truly believe they
are speaking as individuals, their thinking may nonetheless
be influenced by their company's business model and technology
focus.  Our knowledge of requirements is strongly influenced by
the customers we talk to.  I think this is particularly true
in small technology companies, where it is all but impossible
to separate the company view from the perspective of its key
technical people.

Potential conflicts of interest worry me most in the process
of deciding whether a WG will work on something, since this
is what most directly affects business models and licensing
strategies of organizations that may have an interest in
something *not* being standardized, or in letting the market
drive a particular implementation into the position of "de facto
standard".  Once the decision has been made to permit a WG
to work on a particular problem, I think our normal technical
review processes should be trusted to ensure that the solution
chosen is fairly reasonable.

One of the ironies of disclosure is that sometimes others
will read ulterior motives into the actions of someone who
is going out of their way to avoid blocking or interfering
with work that, for whatever reason, they do not chose to
actively support.

 ------------------------------------------------------
 Randy Presuhn          BMC Software, Inc.  SJC-1.3141
 [email-masked]  2141 North First Street
 Tel: +1 408 546-1006   San José, California 95131  USA
 ------------------------------------------------------
 My opinions and BMC's are independent variables.
 ------------------------------------------------------

---

From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Dec 2002 21:40:12 -0500

> the customers we talk to.  

I don't think we're expected to be omniscient. I think we're expected
to try to understand the diversity of interests that might be affected
by a protocol and to try to work for the greater good.

Keith